


to write is to engrave on stone

by smallredboy



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Breaking the Fourth Wall, Crack Treated Seriously, Domestic, M/M, Post-Fall (Hannibal), Writer Will Graham
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-28
Updated: 2020-05-28
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:40:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24414493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smallredboy/pseuds/smallredboy
Summary: Will writes a script for a certain TV show.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 4
Kudos: 65
Collections: Prompt Table Challenge: Shippy Building, Trope Bingo: Round Fourteen





	to write is to engrave on stone

**Author's Note:**

> **trope bingo:** breaking the fourth wall  
>  **shippy building @ creativechallenges:** watching tv
> 
> enjoy!

Hannibal finds Will writing on the desk at their cabin, on the laptop they had bought while settling themselves down in Cuba. It was quite a trek, and they've gotten used to the Spanish and the sandy beaches, trying to keep a low profile for the most part.

"What are you writing, Will?" he asks.

He stops typing and looks up at him, capturing his lips in a kiss. "Something rather autobiographical," he says.

"In script format?" 

"Yes," he nods. "I was thinking about sending it to some company. NBC or something, perhaps they should pick it up."

"What changes are you doing to our story?" He sits next to him, presses a kiss against his jaw before resting his head on his shoulder, watching the words on the screen with the utmost curiosity.

"I added a, um, stag motif, to my hallucinations back when I had encephalitis," he says. "Lots of antlers in my dreams and my hallucinations. And then, like, there's this creature, that's a stag but with like, a raven's feathers over it, you know…"

"Is it meant to represent anything?"

"Our relationship," he says. "The day I went and got arrested, that episode is going to start with me hunting down the stag."

"Very evocative."

"Thank you," he replies. "Then there's this like… creature, I haven't described it in length but it's like, you but fucked up, you know? Just kind of a monstrous you, as a way to represent the Ripper."

"Great idea," he says. "I assume the pilot starts with our meeting?"

"Sort of. You only appear halfway through the episode, as it's focused around Hobbs. It's like, very typical crime procedural, you know. But then shit gets more like, Gothic horror-styled. There's lots of elements of that, and we also get really gay."

"I sure hope so," he jokes, laughing softly. 

"I'm leaving it like, vague and brief for the first season and a half… and then halfway through I'm going to do that little moment we had at that stable, you know, with the horse thing."

" _Is your social worker in that horse?_ "

"Yes, exactly," Will nods. "And you're just, going to take my gun and put your hand on the back of my neck and say some gay shit about how you could never entirely predict me."

"That's cute," he says.

"Even cuter is the dream sequence I have directly after it— the episode ends like that, and then the next one starts with a dream."

"What happens in it?"

"I'm trying to kill you. It's based on a real dream I had, but like, a lot more romantic and it has the stag in it. You're like, tied up to a tree and you look _really_ pleased about being tied up to a tree—"

"Is that a recurring motif? For me to be _really_ into you killing me?"

Will winks at him in response and continues, "And then, there's the stag tightening the rope. And you say something about appealing to your better nature and I reply by saying I wasn't aware you had one. And then… God, let me just show you what I make you say." He looks through a sift of documents on the laptop before opening one up.

Hannibal looks at it and his eyes shine before leaning down to press a kiss into Will's mouth. "You're a _sap_ , Will Graham. You are writing me as a sap."

"Right as I'm about to kill you, too! I don't doubt you'd do that, though."

"Oh, definitely." He lets out a quiet chuckle. "Does the show end with our fall?"

"Yes," he nods. "I kind of wanted to like, go beyond that, but you know, I don't have much material for more seasons. Like we're just being domestic and being in love and eating people, y'know? There's not much fun in that, for a TV show." He straightens up. "Wait, I forgot to mention — I made you say _so_ many cannibalism puns."

"No!" Hannibal exclaims.

"Yes," he replies. "I thought it'd be really funny and add a lot to all the nonsense you put everyone through."

He huffs. "That's fair, I suppose."

"It's funny," Will insists. "And also another thing I've changed — you have like, no sense of fashion. Like you wear suits like you do here in real life, but they're all hideous."

"What do you mean they're all hideous?"

"You put like, three patterns on at once. It's _ugly_. And no one bothers you about it, somehow. Maybe everyone just brushes off all your weird jokes and weird comments and weird clothes on the fact you're European."

"Please don't make me unfashionable in your TV show version of me," Hannibal pleads.

"I can and I will," he says. "It's fun, to just change some things about your character. And I'm sure the actor that portrays you will do you justice and make you look handsome, even in horrible patterned suit-and-tie looks."

He huffs. "I sure hope so, Will."

* * *

Several months later, while perusing cable TV at their cabin (which they've managed to pay with no one recognizing them, thank God), there's a TV show announced for a _fictionalized version of the tale of the Murder Husbands_. The credits for the writer goes to a man Will has never heard of, but he's been keeping emails with the crew. They've sworn to keep his identity a secret, and he's managed to keep geo-tags out of his laptop, anyway.

It takes until episode nine of season two for Will to have any reproaches to make toward the directing and the cuts on his scripts. For the most part, it's all perfect and almost as he imagined it in his head. Except for when they get to the dream sequence where Hannibal tells Will he loves him, amongst other things.

"No one can be fully aware of another human being unless we love them. By that love we see potential in our beloved. Through that love we allow our beloved to see their potential. Expressing that love, our beloved's potential comes true."

Will holds his breath as he watches the scene. And then it cuts to the TV's Will saying, "I promised you a reckoning."

"What!" Will exclaims, standing up. "They cut out the _I love you, Will_! It's already gay as Hell, what on Earth is NBC scared of? The cowardice!"

"Stop yelling, Will," he says, grabbing his arm.

"Absolutely not!" he exclaims. "They took out _that_! Why on Earth would they take out that! I'm going to yell at them through my email."

"Please do not," he says. "There's — there's still, you're still getting our love on TV, Will, next season. It's alright."

Will grumbles nonsense and kisses Hannibal, trying to distract himself from the frustration that comes from them cutting off that _very_ vital part of the dialogue, the part that lets the viewer know that Will knows Hannibal is in love with him, that Will might feel exactly the same way back— especially with the new meaning that it gives last episode's _I envy you your hate_. 

He's pissed by the change, but he guesses that's how production companies work.

* * *

It takes a year, but they get to the bluffs. They get to a beautifully choreographed version of their fight against the Dragon — which was a lot messier than the one shown on screen, the one Will wrote down the script for. There was a lot more blood, and they could barely stand in the end, barely could even make remarks about blood looking black in the moonlight.

"This is all I've ever wanted for you, Will," Hannibal says on the TV.

The Hannibal next to him holds onto his hand tight.

Will looks at Dolarhyde's corpse, at the blood coating both of their faces. "It's beautiful," he whispers, shaky and emotional.

He drives them off the cliff, and they are out of the frame. They are gone as the music plays, something Will hadn't even imagined would happen on the screen, simply leaving the instructions, suggesting for there to be music with lyrics, but he never expected something as beautiful and haunting as _Love Crime_.

"We're canonical, at least," Will says, using his free hand to take a long sip of whiskey from his glass.

"The media might argue we're not," Hannibal says.

(Will hates how Hannibal is right every damn time about every damn thing.)


End file.
